Author Information

If you want to present your work at RSS’19, you have two options: directly through the RSS submission portal (RSS-Direct), or using the RAL/RSS option that is offered by IEEE Robotics and Automation Letters (RAL/RSS).

Direct submission to RSS’19 works as usual with RSS: your paper will be reviewed in double-blind mode by the RSS Program Committee, who will make the decision of acceptance. In case of acceptance, the final version of the paper
will be published online with open access in the RSS proceedings. Authors of few selected papers will be invited to expand their work and submit to special issues on prestigious journals (IJRR, AuRO, and T-RO).

RAL/RSS submission works as other conference options in RA-L: your paper will be first reviewed by the RA-L Editorial Board. The first round of reviews and recommendations by the RA-L board will be anonymized and shared with the
RSS Program Committee, who will use them to make an autonomous decision regarding presentation at RSS. Publication of a possibly revised version of the paper in RA-L on IEEE Xplore is separately decided by the RA-L Board.

Both RSS-Direct and RAL/RSS submissions to RSS’19 will be evaluated and selected by the RSS Program Committee in double-blind mode. This implies that manuscripts have to be submitted in suitable form to both channels. More
details are reported for the two types of submissions separately.

RSS-Direct submissions may be up to 8 pages in length, including figures but possibly excluding references. Two additional pages can be used for references. However, extra pages can contain ONLY references. This will be strictly
enforced. Submissions can use a font no smaller than 10 points. Submissions violating these guidelines will not be considered. A paper template is available in LaTeX and
MS-Word. It is advised to use Paperplaza’s Compliant Conversion feature to generate compliant Pdf files directly from your MS-Word files and LaTeX file packs. If you prefer to
generate your own PDF, please make sure that all fonts are embedded (PDF/A-1a compatibility is recommended).

Double Blind Submission

Reviewing for RSS 2019 will be double blind, meaning the reviewers should not know the names or affiliation of the paper authors. The following general principles should be applied in submissions:

Authors names and affiliations should not be cited in the title or text of the submission.

Acknowledgments: Acknowledgments to people or funding agencies should not appear in the submission (it will appear in the final version if the paper is accepted).

Citing of web links to the authors or author’s institute should be avoided.

Related work: In self-citing previous work, avoid expressions such as “In the authors earlier work…”, rather use alternative expressions such as “In previous work…” or “In related work…”, in a manner that does not distinguish their own work from the work of others. Authors should otherwise cite work, including their own, as required for the
completeness of the submission.

Images and descriptions: In presentation of experimental work, avoid logos in pictures, or overt references to an individual laboratory. Use expressions such as “The experimental equipment…” rather
than “The University of XYZ’s Robby the Robot…”. Otherwise authors should include photographs, graphics and other presentation material as in the normal manner for a paper submission.

Supplementary material: In the supplementary materials submitted or linked to in the paper, please make sure to retain anonymity. This includes making sure authors names and affiliations do not appear in the text, weblink (such
as a dropbox link or youtube channel) or filename.

In general authors should avoid obviously attributable self-references while ensuring that the paper is complete, makes appropriate citations of related work and fully describes the contributions made.

Supplementary Multimedia Materials

RSS’19 considers also multimedia attachments for material accompanying the submission of a paper. Multimedia materials can include

extended derivations or more detailed descriptions

videos

dataset files (e.g., raw data with programs to manipulate them)

source code

readme and instruction files

Multimedia material is intended to enrich the contents of a paper, both in clarity and in added value. IEEE has set up general guidelines for the submission of multimedia, to which RSS’19 adheres. These range from the format, to
the description of content and of user requirements, and to the way this material should be referenced to in the body of the paper. This information is available in the “Multimedia Materials” section of the IEEE “Author Digital
Tool Box” through this link. In addition, specific guidelines hold for RSS’19:

The paper should be self-contained, i.e., fully readable and understandable independently from the multimedia material;

Videos should be prepared allowing portability under various platforms.

Duration: 1-5 minutes;

Size: less than 50 Mb;

Structure: The first submission of videos must be anonymous. If accepted, the final version of the video must describe title, authors and affiliations at the beginning and credits at the end.

Accompanying voice should be in good English

Format: mpeg, mpg, or mp4;

Codecs: only standard codecs allowed;

A video that does not play on a standard platform can be summarily rejected.

A “ReadMe.txt” file (in ASCII text format) should accompany the final version of multimedia material for accepted papers, describing:

Minimum requirements for the user. In particular, provide the version of the software that is required to play/run the submitted files. Include the name of the software, the version number, and any special requirements for the player;

Contact Information. The author should provide contact information in case users have questions regarding the multimedia material (IEEE will not provide any technical support for this);

Authors submit their multimedia material as a single zipped archive file (max 50 MB) during paper submission at the RSS Papercept site.
The multimedia material will be reviewed together with the submitted paper, and included in the on-line proceedings.

Multiple Submissions

Submissions that are identical (or substantially similar) to versions that have been previously published, or accepted for publication, or that have been submitted in parallel to other conferences are not appropriate for RSS and
violate our dual submission policy.

Exceptions to this rule are the following:

Submission is permitted of a short version of a paper that has been submitted to a journal, but has not yet been published in that journal. Authors must declare such dual-submissions either through the paper upload submission
form, or via email to the program chair. It is the authors’ responsibility to make sure that the journal in question allows dual concurrent submissions to conferences.

Submission is permitted for papers presented or to be presented at conferences or workshops without proceedings, or with only abstracts published.

It is acceptable to submit to RSS work that has been made available as a technical report (or similar, e.g. in arXiv) without citing it.

None of the above should be construed as overriding the requirements of other publishing
venues. In addition, keep in mind that author anonymity to RSS reviewers might be compromised for authors availing themselves of exceptions 2 and 3.

Plagiarism

RSS is intolerant of plagiarism. Submitted papers are expected to contain original work executed by the authors with adequate, proper and scholarly citations to the work of others. It is the job of the authors to clearly identify
both their own contribution(s) and also published results / techniques on which they depend or build. RSS reviewers are charged to ensure these standards are met. In cases of alleged plagiarism, the program chair will be guided
by Section 8.2.4 Allegations of Misconduct as laid out by the IEEE in this document.

Instructions for Camera-ready Submissions

The conference proceedings for Robotics: Science and Systems 2019 will be published online with open access, and in a book. A revised version of your paper is due to be uploaded to Paperplaza by AOE 20 May 2019. Please note that
there will be no additional opportunity to revise your paper. Your proceedings submission should, of course, include your names, affiliations, and acknowledgements as we are past the double-blind review phase. In terms of
content, please incorporate the reviewer and meta-reviewer comments.

All instructions for general RA-L authors apply, as reported here. However, for RAL/RSS authors some special provisions also apply:

Paper Format

RAL/RSS submissions may be six pages long, with at most two extra pages allowed at an IEEE standard charge ($175 per extra page). These page limits include everything needed for publication, e.g., figures, tables AND references.
A paper template is available in LaTeX and MS-Word. It is advised to use Paperplaza’s Compliant Conversion feature to generate compliant
Pdf files directly from your MS-Word files and LaTeX file packs. If you prefer to generate your own PDF, please make sure that all fonts are embedded (PDF/A-1a compatibility is recommended).

Double Blind Submission

To enable double-blind review process when considered by the RSS Program Committee, papers should not disclose the names or affiliation of the authors. The following general principles should be applied in submissions:

Authors names and affiliations should not be cited in the title or text of the submission.

Acknowledgments: Acknowledgments to people or funding agencies should not appear in the submission (it will appear in the final version if the paper is accepted).

Citing of web links to the authors or author’s institute should be avoided.

Related work: In self-citing previous work, avoid expressions such as “In the authors earlier work…”, rather use alternative expressions such as “In previous work…” or “In related work…”, in a manner that does not
distinguish their own work from the work of others. Authors should otherwise cite work, including their own, as required for the completeness of the submission.

Images and descriptions: In presentation of experimental work, avoid logos in pictures, or overt references to an individual laboratory. Use expressions such as “The experimental equipment…” rather than “The University of
XYZ’s Robby the Robot…”. Otherwise authors should include photographs, graphics and other presentation material as in the normal manner for a paper submission.

Supplementary material: In the supplementary materials submitted or linked to in the paper, please make sure to retain anonymity. This includes making sure authors names and affiliations do not appear in the text, weblink
(such as a dropbox link or youtube channel) or filename.

In general authors should avoid obviously attributable self-references while ensuring that the paper is complete, makes appropriate citations of related work and fully describes the contributions made. Notice that, for technical
reasons, we cannot guarantee strictly double-blind reviews by the RAL Editorial Board for publication on RA-L, while a double-blind process will be enforced for the RSS Program Committee decision for presentation at RSS’19 and
inclusion in the proceedings.

Copyright and Double Publication

RAL/RSS submissions are subject to an IEEE copyright. According to IEEE copyright, authors can post their papers in public repositories (e.g. ArXiv), provided only that the format is modified with respect to the IEEE publication
(e.g., it does not contain the IEEE logo) https://www.ieee.org/publications/rights/author-posting-policy.html. If a paper is accepted in both RAL and RSS,
then it can be published both in IEEE Xplore and in the online RSS proceedings. However, this will be clesarly indicated by the authors n their final, published versions. The final RSS proceedings version will contain a footnote
in the first page of the type “This paper has been selected to appear also in IEEE Robotics and Automation Letters”. Symmetrically, the RAL version will include a statement such as “This paper has been selected to be presented in
Robotics: Science and Systems 2019, and also appears in the conference proceedings”.